Assessing the Influence of the Physical Sports Facility on Customer Satisfaction within the Context of the Service Experience

It can be argued that customer satisfaction is at the centre of the marketing concept, and strategic planning of physical facilities has been found to influence consumer satisfaction. Considering the spectator sport industry has experienced a tremendous boom in the building of facilities, a better understanding of how facilities influence customers is warranted. A sample of 218 minor league ice hockey spectators was used to investigate the influence of individual physical facility elements on customer satisfaction, and to investigate the influence of the physical facility relative to other targets of quality, namely the core product and service personnel. Multiple regression analysis revealed that facility elements together predicted customer satisfaction (R2 = 0.183, adjusted R2 = 0.162), but that the attributes of the facility had little impact individually. Hierarchical regression analysis revealed that both perceptions of service personnel and of the physical facility contributed to customer satisfaction over and above the impact of customers’ perceptions of the core product. Based on these results, it is argued that managers must address the physical facility in combination with other targets of quality to improve spectators’ levels of customer satisfaction.